City of Change
by Jana.aka.Alice
Summary: Jason Fray thinks he's got the biggest ego in the universe - then he met Clarissa Adele Morgenstern. However, when circumstances force them to work together in an impossible quest, Isabelle and Alec don't think they'll survive - if the demons don't get them they'll just kill each other. (Character switch: What would happen if Clary grew up with Valentine and Jace with Jocelyn?)
1. Prologue: Pandemonium

**Hey there!  
This is one of those 'What-if'-stories:  
What if Jace grew up as a mundane and Clary as a nephilim?  
This is my first story in English, so don't be too hard. **

**Disclaimer: I own nothing.**

It was boring.  
"Jeez, why does the queue always have to be so long?" Jace complained.  
His best friend Simon who was standing next to him began fiddling with his glasses. "You were the one who insisted taking me here so I could 'get a girlfriend and loosen up a bit' as you said."  
Jace rolled his eyes. "That doesn't mean that it has to take us that long to get in."  
In front of the queue a blue-haired guy had started arguing with the security man. After a moment the security man shrugged and let him pass.  
"Hey, look at him." Jace gestured in the direction of the blue haired. His eyes were too green, he was probably wearing contacts. "If you want to get a girl you have to copy some of him."  
"You mean I should dress up like a vampire-hunter and dye my hair?"  
"No. Walk like he does, borrow some of his cocky attitude. Trust me, girls like that."  
"No thanks." Simon murmured and pushed his glasses back up his nose.  
"And get rid of those glasses. You look as if you're on your way to the chess club."  
Simon didn't answer. He didn't know why he was friends with Jace anyways. The two of them were like chalk and cheese. But out of some strange reason Jace had always liked to hang out with him. Maybe it was because Simon always seemed to disappear in Jace's shadow. Simon was fine with that; he didn't like to be the centre of attention anyways, but sometimes Jace was just so annoying... "You talk too much." He sighed.  
But Jace didn't hear him. He was too busy winking at some girls that hid behind their long hair and broke out in giggling fits when Jace only looked at them. Simon thought that there were too many girls of that kind. Jace needed some kind of rejection in order to shrink his too big ego. Too bad that that never happened...  
"Are you coming or not, geek?" Jace called from the entrance. Simon hadn't even noticed that they were at the top of the queue already.  
Oh well, it couldn't get any worse than it was already, right?

Artificial mist clouded the whole club. The coloured light made the dance floor look somewhat unrealistic.  
The boy with the blue hair stroked his long blade with one hand while a sneaky grin played around his lips. It was too easy. A bit of glamour onto the blade and it looked harmless. A bit of glamour into his eyes and the second the security man had seen him he was already inside the club. Of course none of this was necessary but it was part of the game. To fool those _mundane, _those naive mortals, to mock them right in front of their eyes and to see the surprised look on their faces.  
But it wasn't as if mortals weren't good for anything, he thought. His green eyes searched the dance floor; he watched the _mundane_, boys and girls. Their bodies were full of life – waves of energy that filled him with a thrill of anticipation. He grinned again. They didn't know how lucky they were; they didn't know how it was to vegetate in a dead world. The light of their life glowed as bright as candlelight – and it was just as easy to snuff it out.  
He gripped his blade and wanted to step out onto the dance floor when a girl left just this dance floor he wanted to enter and approached him. For a _mundane _she was amazingly beautiful – her long, red hair cascaded down her back in soft curls, fell between the black, feathery wings that she wore as a part of a costume, her eyes were shadowed heavily and she wore a black dress that barely reached her knees. He couldn't see any naked skin though, her boots reached up to cover her thighs. The dress had long arms and for a moment he wondered if she wasn't sweating in that outfit. She shot him a glance, grinned and gestured him to follow him.  
With a sneaky grin she opened a door – the sign said that it was a storing place. _Bingo_, he thought. He didn't notice the siblings following him.

"What now?" Simon asked.  
Jace didn't answer. They were dancing, well, Simon was at least trying. He was quite uncomfortable while Jace looked like a fish in the sea. A young guy was handing out Ecstasy on some herbal base and Simon politely rejected.  
When he turned around to search for Jace he found him already making out with some girl with bright green hair. He sighed.  
Suddenly he noticed that the blue haired guy from before had left the dance floor again. He looked a bit lost just like Simon himself and he remembered Jace saying that he should copy him. Well, it looks like we aren't this different after all, Simon thought.  
"Found a cute girl already?" Jace asked. His face was all red and he was breathing heavily while he plucked a piece of paper with a phone number on it into pieces. He followed Simon's gaze and found the blue head.  
His face fell. "You were looking at him?"  
"You said I should copy him." Simon defended himself because he knew exactly that Jace was very quick with false conclusions.  
Suddenly the boy tensed up. As Jace followed his gaze his breath hitched. The girl standing there was just too beautiful to be true.  
The blonde smirked. "That's why you should copy him." Simon followed the gaze of the blue head but he couldn't see anybody. Well, he was getting uncomfortable with this topic anyways so he desperately tried to change it.  
"The DJ's great tonight. What's his name?" Jace eyed him suspiciously. "You hate Trance."  
He once again turned around to watch the red haired girl. The blue head walked after her as if he was hypnotised. He didn't notice the two black haired, a boy and a girl - both wearing all black - that were slowly getting off the dance floor.  
Jace craned his neck to get a better look at them. Simon kept rambling on about random stuff but the blonde didn't listen to him. He had better things to do. He didn't know why but he had the odd feeling that the black haired guys were following the red girl. Maybe it was because they kept a steady pace into the direction of the girl.  
The red haired girl with the black angle wings on her back had reached the wall and turned around to grin at the blue haired.  
"Oh, by the way, I started to cross-dress lately... And I'm sleeping with your mother! I thought you should know." Simon tried once again.  
The boy and the girl, blue and red, disappeared in the storing room. Jace thought about crashing their intimate moment for a second and wondered about the feeling of jealousy in his gut.  
Suddenly he once again saw the black haired couple – they approached the door of the storage room.  
What was this all about? They were talking. The girl suddenly shrugged and reached into her pocket to draw something from it – it was a long dagger that reflected the light of the stroboscope for a second before the two of them disappeared in the storage room as well.  
Jace didn't hesitate for a second. The best way to win a girl was to appear as her knight in shining armour. And she needed that knight more than she knew now...  
"Hey, where are you going?" Simon shouted after him. "That was meant to be a joke to get your attention!"  
Jace didn't stop. He didn't have time for Simon's silly antics now. He needed to save a girl from some armed maniacs.

"What is your name?"  
She turned around sending her long red hair flying over her shoulder as she turned her head and smiled at him. The only light in the small storage room were the street lights shining through the dirty windows. The door was littered with cable, little pieces of mirror that belonged to a disco ball and empty paint cans.  
"Clarissa."  
"Nice name." He approached her carefully in case that one of the cable on the floor had still electricity on it. She looked like a shadow, as if she could get a black silhouette on the wall any second if she wanted to. He really looked forward to bring her down.  
"I haven't ever seen you here, Clarissa."  
She giggled. "You're cute."  
He approached her further and carefully took her hand while he reached for his blade. There was a small bracelet around her wrist but when he looked closer and realised that it was tattooed into her skin it was already too late.  
She gripped his hand and flipped him onto his back. Something wrapped around his ankle and yanked his feet up into the air.  
Now he understood. The long sleeved dress Clarissa wore wasn't part of the costume. She wore it to cover her skin – every square centimetre of it.  
"Great move, Isabelle." Clarissa smirked. Two black haired people came out of the shadows.  
"Your turn, Alec." Isabelle waved at Alec, who was obviously her brother, who grabbed the blue haired boy and held him to a pillar while Isabelle tied his hands back with some wire. Clarissa stood in front of him and grinned into his face.  
"So, are you the only one or are there more of your kind?"  
The blue haired felt that his wrists got bloody underneath the wire. "My kind?"  
Clarissa rolled her eyes. "Another Play-Dumb-One."  
She sighed and lifted the sleeve of her right arm to show her rune covered skin.  
"You know exactly what I am." Their captive grinded his teeth.  
"A shadow hunter." He hissed.  
Clarissa grinned. "Bingo."

As Jace first opened the door of the storage room and entered it he furrowed his brow and looked around quite confused.  
It was nobody there. But he could swear he had seen four people enter this room.  
He had just turned around to leave, when he heard voices. Some girls laugh and a boy snap roughly at them.  
It was as if they'd come out of nowhere.  
t really look as if she needed his help now, another girl with black hair and a black haired boy. They had the blue haired tied against a pillar with some kind of wire.  
What was going on? The red girl started walking up and down in front of the blue boy.  
"So are there some more of your kind here?" she asked impatiently.  
Of your kind? Was this some kind of gang rivalry?  
"What are you talking about?"  
"She meant other demons." The black haired boy answered for her.  
"Do I need to explain what a demon is?" the red girl asked with mock innocence. The blue haired looked down.  
"Please, Clary, we don't need some extra lessons in demonology." The black haired guy said. Jace could literally hear him rolling his eyes.  
"Do I talk to much?" the girl – Clary – asked their captive.  
"Yes." The dark haired boy and the girl answered in unison. They were obviously siblings.  
"Oh come on, Izzy, Alec, that's not true!" Clary whined.  
The blue haired looked as if he didn't know what to say. "I can give you information." He finally said. "I can tell you where Valentine is."  
Jace still didn't dare to move. Valentine? Demons? Who were those guys?  
"Jeez, each time we catch one of you scumbags you ramble on about Valentine." Clary sighed. "Valentine is dead. Izzy, finish him off; he won't give us any proper information anyways."  
Finish him off? Jace tensed.  
"No, please, let me give you advise!" the blue haired begged.  
Clary just reached for her belt and drew a dagger. "Go to hell. Maybe the devil cares for where Valentine is." She lifted her hand, ready to strike, when Jace couldn't stand it any longer.  
"Hey, easy, you weren't going to kill this dude?" Jeez, why didn't I think about what to say before I jumped out of the shadows, Jace thought.  
All four of them were looking at him as if he was some sort of crazy alien.  
"What is that?" Alec asked. His eyes were wide and he stared at Jace with more than just surprise. There was something how he checked out his body that Jace wasn't comfortable with.  
"It's a boy, Alec." Clary seemed to have caught herself first. "You know what a boy is, right, Alec? You're one yourself." And the cocky attitude was back as well.  
At least on top of the facade, she still checked him out with a shocked look in her eyes. All three of them were still staring at him with wide eyes.  
"It's a _mundane_." Isabelle said tonelessly.  
"But he can see us." Alec added.  
"Why shouldn't I see you? I'm not blind." Jace frowned. "And stop staring at me." He added. "You make me feel uncomfortable."  
Those guys were crazy! He should have called the police. For a second nobody said a word; Clary twirled her dagger between her hands. "Get out of here." She demanded.  
"Why should I?" Jace asked and leaned against a pillar. "And by the way all three of you look at me I think you don't want me to leave either."  
Alec and Isabelle both flushed and turned around to look at the blue haired again. Clary just rolled her eyes.  
"We need to finish our business here and if you don't get lost we'll finish you off as well." Jace eyed the dagger suspiciously.  
"I'd like to see you try." He grinned but the grin was wiped out of his face when Clary launched at him and brought him out of balance. He hit the floor hard while she held him down with her right knee on his chest and her left one on his right wrist while she held his left one turned above his head and her dagger on his throat. All of this had happened within only a few seconds and Jace looked at Clary with wide eyes while he tried to catch his breath which wasn't that easy with Clary on his chest.  
He smirked. "I know I should be afraid but this somehow turns me on." He shouldn't have said that because Clary just narrowed her eyes and Jace could feel the blade of her dagger cut into his skin.  
"Jeez, calm down! You're all crazy!" Jace tried to keep his nonchalance but he could feel sweat drip of his face. "Listen, I'm sorry, but I couldn't let you kill this dude."  
"Why?" Clary asked through gritted teeth. She really had to be angry at him.  
"Because you can't just walk around killing people?" Jace tried.  
"Right. But this is no human. I'm not in the mood to explain it to you right now; I've got business to do."  
She got off him and once again twirled her dagger.  
"Okay, suit yourself. I called the police. I thought you should know." C  
lary rolled her eyes. "I know you _mundane _good enough to know that you're lying." She turned around. "Do it, Izzy."  
Isabelle nodded and took a knife from her belt, but in that very moment the blue haired boy got his arms free from the wire and launched himself at Clary.  
Jace got to his feet and jumped in to help the red haired, but when he tried to tear the blue haired off the girl the boy whipped around and struck Jace with his left hand. Jace stumbled back clutching his arm. When he looked at his hand there was blood on it. Damn it. Did the boy have a knife? But when he looked closer it looked like the boy had grown claws that tore open Clary's skin. The girl screamed in pain and rage and kicked the boy in the gut.  
He stumbled back and Jace wondered why he didn't crumble on the floor gasping and coughing.  
Clary got to her feet, smearing her dagger with her own blood when she grabbed it harder and once again jumped to thrust it into the blue haired boy's chest. Jace's breath hitched when he saw the black liquid stream out of the wound. Clary stood next to the boy who was bleeding black blood now and clutched her shoulder. Her black dress was even darker where her blood stained it.  
The blue haired turned around and looked at Clary with hatred in his eyes. "_So be it. May the _Forsaken _get you all."  
_Clary didn't answer; she was still preoccupied with her shoulder. She didn't even look at the not-boy when his body began to shrink until it disappeared.  
Jace carefully took a step backwards. He didn't need this girl; she was too much trouble for his taste. Normally he really liked troublemaker girls but they shouldn't be heavily armed death-angles.  
"Where do you think you are going?" Of course she had noticed. She was probably a trained killer; she should notice everything in her surroundings. "You could have gotten yourself killed! Are you suicidal?" she asked through gritted teeth.  
"He was about to kill you!" Jace defended himself.  
"Of course he wanted to kill me. He's a demon; they are made to kill people. But you did not only nearly kill yourself but also distracted us so it could get his hands out of the wire! You nearly got us _all _killed!"  
"Well how should I know?! Not everybody is a crazy freak-fighter that gets born to kill demons that look like human and disappear after you've killed them! As you said before, I'm a stupid _mundane_!" Jace shouted at Clary.  
The red haired furrowed her brows. "What did you call us?"  
"It doesn't matter! I'm out." He once again turned around and wanted to leave the storage room but suddenly something wrapped around his wrist tightly. Jace hissed in pain.  
"What shall we do with him? He can see us. He already knows too much." He heard Isabelle say.  
"Let him go. Nobody is going to believe him anyways." Clary wiped her dagger with a piece of cloth and stuck it back into her belt. Isabelle loosened her whip and Jace rubbed his burning wrist.  
"Shouldn't we take him with us?" Alec asked sceptical.  
"Alec, he's a _mundane. _We can't take him to the institute, even if I think that Hodge would love to talk to her." Isabelle answered. Clary narrowed her eyes and carefully approached Jace. The blonde boy gulped. The way she walked in his direction resembled a predator approaching his prey.  
He didn't look at her beauty anymore; Clary looked like danger in person.  
"Don't be crazy, you can't kill me. My body wouldn't disappear after..."  
"Hey, what are you doing in here?" Jace turned around quickly and saw a security man enter the storage room.  
"I... um..."  
"And who are you talking to?" the man interrupted.  
Jace turned around. Clary stood right behind him and grinned. She waved at the security man but he didn't seem to see her.  
"I... I thought I saw somebody going in here." He knew it was a lame excuse but he didn't have the nerve to explain that there were some invisible guys that only he could see. He would probably land in an asylum.  
"What happened to your arm?"  
"My arm?"  
"It's all bloody." Jace looked at his arm. "Oh, um, somebody bumped into me with some broken bottle. Don't worry, it's nothing."  
He heard Clary chuckle. He needed to get out of here, he started to see things.

"So, _why _did we have to go?" Simon asked for the third time now.  
Jace rolled his eyes. He gestured at his bandaged arm and murmured something about armed lunatics that kill demons and think that they are some kind of ninjas.  
He finally managed to get the attention of a cabby, got into the cab and told the cabby his address.  
Simon climbed in as well and closed the door.  
"You look like you've seen a ghost."  
Jace just stared at his feet. "Maybe I have."

**Sooo... I took some passages of the original book but I only had the German book so I had to translate it back into English. Sorry if it's crappy. Please tell me what you think of it and if there are any mistakes in it; the grammar-check on my Microsoft Office is a bit crappy. **

**R&amp;R**


	2. Secrets and Lies

**Hi there! **

**I was quite surprised that this story had so much support after only one chapter.  
Here's the second chapter; Secrets and Lies.  
Enjoy!**

**Disclaimer: I don't own The Mortal Instruments of the song Demons; all the Copyrights go to Cassandra Clare and Imagine Dragons. **

* * *

"So you climbed out of the window?" Eric asked disbelievingly.

Jace just strummed an accord on his guitar. "It wasn't my fault that there'd been a traffic jam so it was totally unjustified of her to ground me. So..." He looked at their disbelieving faces. "Do you want to play anything or do you want to change the name of the band _again?"_

"The _Window-Climbers_" Eric suggested. "We'll sound like some sort of perverts." Jace protested.

But the other band members agreed so Jace couldn't do anything than sigh and shake his head on their antics.

"You wanna sing anything?" he asked again and began playing. "How about 'Demons' of Imagine Dragons?"

Just moments later the _Window-Climbers _were all lost in their music. But Jace just couldn't concentrate. And that wasn't because Eric always lost the tact on his drum set and Kirk's singing voice was horrible.

It were the lyrics that made memories rise to the surface.

_When you feel my heat  
Look into my eyes  
It's where my demons hide  
It's where my demons hide  
Don't get too close  
It's dark inside  
It's where my demons hide  
It's where my demons hide_

He had to think about red-haired Clary and the blue-haired demon-boy whose corpse had vanished just after Clary had stabbed him with her dagger. Somehow, he thought, it was also possible that not the blue-haired but Clary had been the demon that had been born to kill human. And why hadn't the security-dude been able to see them?

The song was coming to an end and Jace put his guitar away.

"I think we should play this one at out next gig." Simon suggested. Everybody nodded excitedly. Jace was still deep in thoughts when his phone buzzed.

He lazily glanced at the display – and flinched. "Damn it!" he swore while frantically searching for an excuse why he wasn't at home anymore. "Hi mum!" he answered the phone and noticed that he sounded quite guilty. This wasn't about to end well.

"Hello Jason Fray." 'Crap. She addressed me by my full name... This isn't about to end well.' Jace thought.

"I just wondered where you are." She still sounded calm. Dangerously calm.

"Well, I... I- I was bored so I- I went to the library." 'Damn it, why am I so bad at acting?'

"Jason Fray, you're a horrible liar. You forget that you're not grounded. There's no need to climb out of the window."

"I'm not?" he asked surprised. His band colleagues frantically whispered some excuses that he could use; some of them were just as bad as his first one but other ones were way better so he decided to remember some of them in case he needed them in some point in his life. He waved them off and mouthed 'It's okay.' "I'm over at Eric's for a band rehearsal. That reminds me, I promised to give some moral backup for the poetry evening tonight."

She hesitated. Jace could hear it. "It's just a poetry evening."

"I'd rather talk to you about this in person." She chose her words carefully. Jace wondered why. "Would you please come home now?"

Jace understood less by the second. Why was his mother behaving that strangely? "Why so?" "Would you please just come home?" This time she seemed on edge. Jace thought for a second. "Okay." he answered and ended the phone call.

"Sorry guys, 'gotta run." He put his guitar in its case and grabbed his jacket. "Trouble?" Kirk asked. Jace shook his head. "I'm not sure. She sounded a bit off." "Don't forget the poetry evening tonight!" Eric shouted after him and Jace waved back before he got onto his bike and drove off.

* * *

When Jace opened the door of the retro-style house he and his mother lived in he could already hear voices. The first one was his mother, the second one sounded a bit like Luke, his mum's best friend.

As silent as he could he snuck up the stairs until he could hear their conversation.

"...Bane." his mother said. They hadn't closed the door; probably because Luke had just arrived. "I'm trying to reach him for three weeks now. His answer machine says he's in Tanzania. What shall I do now?"  
Bane?  
"Jocelyn." Jace could literally hear him shaking his head. "You can't run after him for the rest of your life."  
"But Jace..." Jace tensed. This conversation was about him?  
"...is not Jonathan." Luke hissed. Jonathan? Was this about his father? "You've changed a lot after _it _had happened. You've never been the same, but Jace's not Jonathan."  
Jocelyn sighed. "Of course not. Jonathan was a demon. Sometimes I wonder if his soul had been just as black as his eyes."  
"You know that Jace's different." Luke answered soothingly. "You've lost two children and I'm still very sorry for little Clarissa, she was so angel-like. But you've got a wonderful son now, Jocelyn."  
Jace could hear his mother sigh.  
"I still don't know if he's really as normal as he seems. I bet that Valentine did some experimenting on him; otherwise he hadn't ordered me to get him."  
Demon? Two children? Clarissa? Valentine, experimenting, get him? What was this all about? The demon at pandemonium had spoken about some Valentine and the red-haired girl's name had been Clary. Could it be...?  
"But I can't lock him into the apartment. He'll just climb out of the window again. He needs his freedom."  
"Of course!" Luke sounded furious. "He's not a pet; he's a teenager. He's nearly fully grown up now!"  
"What if we leave the city..."  
"You've got to talk to him. I'm serious." Jace could see that Luke was about to leave so he stomped up the stairs with as much noise as possible and shouted: "I'm home!"

Both of them flinched. "Oh my god!" Luke gasped.

"It's just me." Jace answered smiling. "Even though some people told me we're quite similar."

Jocelyn shot him an irritated look. "Did you eavesdrop?" Jace grinned. "No, I've just walked through the door. Why? Were the two of you kissing or something of sorts?" Luke went the shade of Jocelyn's hair; Jocelyn kept silent and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.

"So, you wanted to talk to me?" Jace asked and leant against the wall. "What's so important that you couldn't even tell me over the phone?" His mother scratched her ear obviously searching for the right words.

Jace frowned. "Please don't tell me you're pregnant; and if you are, please don't tell me Luke's the father. I wouldn't get the pictures out of my head." "

Jace!" Luke scolded. This time Jocelyn went crimson red.

"No, it's not that..." she began. Jace sighed in relief. "Thank god." He went past them to enter the apartment without looking at the adult's red faces.

Something was different. Jace frowned again. "What are the cardboard boxes for?"

Jocelyn obviously wanted to evade the issue so she glanced at Luke for support. "We're going on vacation." Luke answered for her. Jace's frown deepened. "I don't understand. You're going on vacation. What are you so anxious about?" Jace asked his mother.

She shook her head. "You don't understand. When I said that we're going on vacation I mean the three of us, you, Luke and I. We're going to the country-house."

"Oh." Jace deadpanned. Luke's face was drained of emotions and his jaw clenched. Why was he so upset about this? "Just for my schedule, how long are we gonna stay?"

"For the rest of the summer." Jocelyn answered. "I bought those boxes in case you want to take anything with you. You know, books, music sheets for your guitar..."

"Wait a second." Jace interrupted. "The _whole _rest of the summer? Why did you plan this without asking me first? I also have some plans for this holiday. We'll have some gigs with our band..."

"I'm sorry but I think your friends will understand. I need to get away from all of this and we're running out of money... It will be nice, I promise! As I remember you've always loved our country house!"

"Mom, I'm not four anymore. Can't I stay here or something? I can get a job and I bet we'll get a lot of money at our gigs." Jocelyn just shook her head.

"No. I don't know if something will happen when we're away..."

Something inside Jace snapped. "Would you please stop acting like I'm a toddler!" he snarled. Jocelyn flinched.

Luke scowled at him. "Jace!"

"And your 'to-be-or-not-to-be-romance' is a pain in the ass too! Be a couple or stop acting like one!" the teenager shouted enraged and stormed right past the shocked adults.

"Where are you going?" his mother asked weakly. Jace groaned. "Mom, I'm nearly seventeen! You don't need to baby me!" She looked down. "Feel free to make plans without me while I'm out." he added nastily and stormed down the staircase.

There was another woman living in the ground floor. 'MADAME DOROTHEA; SEER AND FORTUNETELLER' the sign at the door said. Normally Jace didn't mind the old lady at all but today he nearly choked at the smell of joss sticks coming from the door. It just pissed him off. An old, gloomy lady with a lot of jewellery on her that always smelled of joss sticks – he just wanted to kick in her door.

Just when he was about to set his plan into motion the door opened and a man left the apartment. Tall, tanned skin, catlike gold and green eyes and tousled black hair. The man frowned; then he smiled at him so Jace could see his sharp, white teeth.

Suddenly Jace stumbled backwards and nearly fell. He caught himself in time though and frowned. What just happened? There was a fuzzy feeling inside his head as if someone had messed around with it. He blinked. There had been someone – some_thing _coming out of Madame Dorothea's door.

"Probably the cat." Jace mumbled to himself. He decided to go and get something to drink to get rid of the headache he had suddenly become.

* * *

Jace paid for his lemonade, sat down and stared out of the window. All of a sudden his usually boring life was full of unsolved mysteries.

He asked for a pen and started writing _Jocelyn, Valentine, Clarissa, Jonathan, demon, experiments _and _get him _onto a napkin. There wasn't any sense in it.

His mobile started buzzing. He glanced at the display and groaned when he saw that it was his mother calling. With one move of his hand he switched the devise off and pocketed it.

The _Valentine had ordered me to get him _almost sounded as if he was adopted or something like that. Did his mother have children before him? And why did she never speak of them? Come to think about it – his mother never talked about her past. It was as if her life had begun when she got him.

And then there were these moments when he looked at something and seemed to have forgotten about it the moment he looked away. Just like this strange incident with Madame Dorothea's cat. Wait – Madame Dorothea didn't own a cat.

Jace frowned – he didn't know how often he had done so today – this was getting stranger by the second. Just now he realised that Clary very much resembled his mother. Could this be a coincidence? But Jocelyn had talked about some Girl called Clarissa...

And who was Bane? The name did ring a bell but he couldn't put his finger on it. He had to think about a cat.

There were too many cats in this.

Jace took a sip of his lemonade. It seemed to be that damn obvious that it had to jump into his face but he couldn't capture it. Anyways, he'd be late for the poetry reading.

With a sigh Jace put down the empty glass and stood up.

Maybe he had a fever. Everywhere around him strange things happened. A woman with bright blue skin walked past him. A little girl hugged a fairy doll with golden wings that seemed to move.

Jace hastily looked somewhere else. What was happening to him?

* * *

**Hm, I guess I let Jace overreact a bit, didn't I?**

**I'm sorry that this chapter's so much shorter than the prologue.**

**Oh well. Please tell me what you think about it and if there are any mistakes in it. My grammar-checker's still not working like it should. **

**R&amp;R!**


	3. Shadowhunter

**Heyo! **

**I'm so excited! You guys are the best; I didn't expect so many follows and favorites. **

**Also I want to thank all my dear reviewers for their feedback :)))**

**Sooo...**

**Here's the third chapter of 'City of Change'**

**Hope you like it :)**

* * *

When Jace entered the _Java Jones _the first person he saw was Simon who approached him directly.

"Thank god, you're here too." Jace scratched the back of his head.

Eric was already on stage jumping up and down in front of the microphone. Matt was behind him; he looked already stoned and was playing a djembe.

"This is going to be horrible." Jace turned on his heel and wanted to leave before Eric could spot him but Simon held him back. "Oh no, you don't. Please don't let me alone with those maniacs. Plus, you've promised." Jace rolled his eyes. "You owe me one." he finally said and decided to get some coffee from the bar.

It was better than going back home again at least. Why was his mom always so overprotective? Damn it, he was seventeen and not four anymore.

"Is there any free sit in here?" he asked Simon to get his mind off his major problems. The _Java Jones _was filled with teenagers who enjoyed their free Monday evening. Finally Jace spotted a tiny sofa in the darkest corner of the room. "Great; it's a place where Eric can't find us after the show to ask him what we think of his poems." he grinned and collapsed into the sofa.

It was one of those sofas you had the feeling of drowning in because they were that oversoft. Simon shyly watched a blonde girl with an orange strappy top who was furiously tapping her IPod.

"Why don't you go and ask her out?" Jace asked Simon. Simon flinched and looked away.

"I can be your wingman if you want me to." the blonde boy offered. His best friend just shook his head. Jace rolled his eyes. "Oh come on, you had checked her out just a second ago!" Simon gulped, looked over to the girl again and sighed. "Come on; you're the only one in our band who hasn't ever gotten a girl!"

If looks could kill Jace would've died on an instant. But that wasn't the case so Jace just sighed and leaned back. "Suit yourself." This time Simon exploded. "I didn't ask for being that shy!" he whisper-shouted furiously. "Believe me; if I had the guts I had asked her out when I first saw her!"

Jace just rolled his eyes. "You don't seem very shy to me at the moment." he replied.

Simon growled and Jace wouldn't have been surprised when he had bared his teeth. What actually surprised him was when Simon hissed "Fine." and walked over to the girl that was reading a magazine now. It looked as if he had to force himself to do even a single step. Jace chuckled. He probably was pale as a corpse by now. "Hi, my name's Simon; what's yours?"

Jace facepalmed. That had to be practiced.

The blonde girl giggled. "It's your first time asking a girl out, isn't it?" Simon blushed furiously while Jace had to hold back his laughter. "Oh, don't worry; there's a first time at everything." the girl grinned. "By the way, my name's Mia." Simon sat down beside Mia and the two of them started to talk about some anime Jace didn't know. Well, every Jack has his Jill. The two of them were made for each other. Mia giggled at some joke Simon made and Jace smiled.

Suddenly a piercing acoustic feedback interrupted his mental peace. Jace flinched and had to force back the urge to cover his ears.

On stage Eric fought bravely against his microphone; it seemed like he was losing his fight but in the end he finally regained control.

"Okay, sorry for that, guys!" he yelled. "My name's Eric and that's my homeboy Matt at the drums. My first poem's called 'Untitled'." He screwed up his face as if in pain, and wailed into the mike. "Come, my faux juggernaut, my nefarious loins! Slather every protuberance with arid zeal!"

Simon buried his face in his hands and nearly pushed his glasses off his nose. Mia was surely suppressing her laughter while Jace didn't even bother to. Nobody but Eric used the word 'loins' in their poems. It was just hilarious.

"Turgid is my torment!" Eric wailed and Jace cracked up. "Agony swells within!" For a moment Jace thought that ‚Furious Mole' would be quite a good name for their band. Well, at least better than 'The Window Climbers'.

An amused chuckle let him whirl around. There was a red-haired girl sitting beside him – right beside him! He couldn't recall seeing her sitting there earlier. It was as if she had appeared out of nowhere.

It was Clary. This time she wore black leather pants, a tanktop of the same colour and combat boots as well as black fingerless gloves. In her broad black belt she kept several knives and daggers.

"Clary?" Jace asked disbelieving. She shot him a catlike grin. "Oh, I hope you don't mind me sitting next to you. It was the only free spot in the whole cafe."

She reached for her necklace and began playing with the broad silver ring she wore on a string around her neck. "Mind if we speak outside? It's too noisy in here to do a proper conversation."

With that she stood up and made a beeline for the exit. Jace hastily got up from his sofa and followed her as fast as he could. He would explain it all to Simon later. He had to catch up to a red-haired girl that could probably be his sister.

* * *

"Your friend's poems are horrible." Clary said as Jace came out of the cafe.

The ring she had been playing with earlier hung at her chest. This time she was tinkering with some devise that looked like a phone to Jace.

By the way, he should probably switch his mobile back on. His mom was surely going crazy by now. "Glad somebody shares my opinion." he answered nonchalantly. "But enough of Eric's poetry, if you can even call it poetry. Why are you here? It looks as if you've been following me." He grinned at Clary. "Don't get me wrong; you can follow me wherever you want."

Clary rolled her eyes. "Why couldn't I leave this assignment to Isabelle..." she muttered quietly.

Jace grinned. "Maybe because you wanted me all by yourself?" Jace guessed. "It's impolite not to share. But don't worry, there's enough Jace for everybody." Clary groaned and muttered something about 'stupid mundanes'. Then she seemed to pull herself together and got back to her old cocky self.

She raised an eyebrow and approached him. "You're an really interesting riddle." she muttered to herself. "You look just like any other mundane but you can see me... See us..."

Jace frowned. "Wait a second, what do you mean by 'mundane'?" he interrupted her monologue. She shrugged. "Somebody from the human world. Like you."

Jace blinked. Had she lost it? "You're a human yourself." he argued.

Clary smirked. "Yeah, if you put it that way. But I'm not as human as you think I am." She sounded quite bored. "I'm here to take you with me." she informed him. "You may have not think so but Hodge thinks you could be dangerous."

"Look who's talking." Jace muttered. "Yesterday I saw you killing somebody. You thrusted a dagger between that blue haired guy's ribs and..." He stopped. "By the way, didn't this 'demon' slice up your back?" He looked down at his arm. His mom had just gritted her teeth and put a bandage on it without asking any questions. She had known that he hadn't answered any of them anyways.

Clary shrugged as if she hadn't heard his last question. "Okay, there may be blood on my hands but at least I know who I am. Something I'm not sure you can tell about you."

"Jeez, this is getting gloomy. Get to the point." Jace interrupted once again.

Clary's green eyes caught fire. "You can be glad that my only task is to get you to the institute and not to kill you." she hissed.

Jace lifted his hands in defeat. "Calm down. You get worked up quite easily." The girl shot him one last death glare before she brought herself into control once more.

"Show me your right hand." she demanded. Jace obeyed. She took it into hers and twisted and turned it to look at it from all angles.

"My right hand won't be of much use for you. I'm left handed." Jace informed her amused. Clary's eyes shot daggers at him when she grabbed his left hand and examined it in the same way she had done with his right hand. Finally she let it drop. "Nothing." She frowned. "That's strange."

"What were you searching for anyway?" Jace asked.

Clary sighed. "I was searching for a rune. Most shadow hunter kids get their first one very early." She showed him her right hand.

"There's nothing." Jace answered honestly.

Clary sighed in annoyance. "You need to relax a bit."

"You've lost it." Jace answered and shook his head.

Clary once again sighed. "Well, believe it or not. I need to take you with me."

Jace grinned cockily. "So you're here to abduct me? Sweet."

"No, I'm not." Clary hissed. "Hodge told me to get you. He wants to talk to you."

"So you're here to abduct me." Jace repeated. "And who the hell is Hodge? And why would he want to talk to me?"

"Hodge's my tutor." Clary answered calmly. "And he wants to talk to you because you know too much about us."

This time Jace couldn't stop himself; he cracked up. "You sound like some mysterious girl in a horror movie. 'You know too much.'" he imitated her voice and cracked up once more.

Clary grinned. "Maybe I get permission to use you as a target to practice throwing knives." she replied smoothly.

Jace was about to talk back when he was interrupted by the piercing sound of his mobile ringing. "Excuse me for a second." He got it out of his pocket and rolled his eyes when he spotted his mom's number on the display. He decided to answer it just to annoy Clary a little bit more. She looked cute when she was worked up.

"Hi mom!"

"Jace, thank god." Her voice was filled with panic. Alarm bells started to ring in Jace's head. "Jace, you have to listen carefully..."

"Mom, I'm okay, you don't have to worry. I'm still at the Java Jones. I'll be home in a minute."

"_No!_" The scared tone in his mom's voice shocked him. "Don't come home! Do you understand, Jace? Don't – under no circumstances – come home. Go to Simon's place. Go to Simon's place immediately and wait till I..." There was a loud noise in the background. Something heavy fell down and burst. Clary watched his face with worry. It was probably filled with fear and panic.

"Mom! Are you okay?"

"Promise me not to come home!" Jace heard Jocelyn's voice through the static. "Go to Simon's and call Luke tell him..." Once again something burst in the background. "...Tell him that _hehehe _found me."

"Who found you? Mom!" Jace realised that he was nearly crying by now. "Have you called the police already?" He felt so helpless. When he was talking to others he could stay calm but he wasn't able to do anything in this case.

Suddenly he heard a hollow sound coming through the phone and his mother gasped before she continued to speak in a deadly calm tone:

"I love you Jace."

With that one last sentence she ended the call.

* * *

"Mom!" Jace panicked. He tried to call Jocelyn again but she didn't answer.

Just when he tried a second time the battery died. Jace stared at the now useless devise in his hand for a second before he yelled some curses at it and hurled it into a waste bin. He started pacing and pulled his hair. He knew that it were just a few seconds before he broke down completely.

"What happened?" Clary asked soothingly. Jace whirled around. He had completely forgotten about her.

He thought for a second. "Give me your phone." he demanded.

Clary cocked an eyebrow. "I don't have a phone with me."

"Stop lying!" he yelled at her and grabbed the black devise she had been tinkering with earlier.

"That's no mobile. It's a Sensor." Clary explained.

Jace didn't listen to her. "I need to call the police!" he whispered frantically and started pushing buttons. Nothing happened. Just when he was about to throw away the Sensor Clary grabbed his hand. Her grip was surprisingly firm.

"Tell me what happened." she commanded urgently. He glared at her. "I can help you, if you want me to."

For a second burning rage filled his body and he pushed her petite body away as strong as he could. With a surprised yelp she stumbled backwards and Jace made a run for it.

He just hoped that she didn't follow him.

* * *

**Yeah, I know it's crappy. I'm not good at writing conversation; it always sounds dull. **

**Please tell me what you think of it and if there are any mistakes in it. **

**Thanks for the Support!**

**R&amp;R**


	4. Ravener

**Hi guys, I'm very, very sorry that I didn't update in a while but somehow school turned my life upside down...**

**Anyways, I'm publishing this chapter now, I had no idea how to adjust it to Jace; Clary wouldn't be able to carry him to the Institute.**

**So, I really hope you'll enjoy this.**

During the afternoon the air had gotten heavy.

When Jace sprinted to get home he felt as if he were swimming through honey.

He wasn't fast enough, he would never be fast enough until he could run as fast as light. He managed to cross a street before the traffic light could stop him and continued running.

What had happened? Who had attacked his mother?

_Maybe she isn't even your mother _a voice in the back of his head whispered.

He shooed it off and ran around the last corner. From what he could see from the outside everything was normal. The lights in the apartment were sending a warm shimmer down to where he came to a halt to empty his pockets to find the key.

Everything seemed so terribly normal that Jace was almost happy to find the hallway dark. The light bulb had blown and sent the staircase into darkness.

Jace thanked god that he wasn't afraid of the dark anymore and set his foot onto the first step of the stairs.

"Where are you going?" Jace could barely hold back a very girly scream when he whirled around to search for the owner of the husky voice. When his eyes adjusted to the darkness in the hallway he noticed the armchair that was standing in the door of Madame Dorothea's flat. Sitting in it was an old lady looking almost as if she wouldn't ever get out of it again.

Jace wanted to ignore her but she wouldn't let him off that easily.

"Your mother made quite a pandemonium up there. What was she doing? Moving furniture?"

"Listen, I don't have..."

"And the light bulb blew." She sighed as if it was the end of the world that she was sitting in the darkness now. "Can't your mother ask her boyfriend if he could change it?"

"Luke's not..."

"And the skylight is dirty once again; no wonder it's that dark..."

"LUKE'S NOT SOME KIND OF A JANITOR!" Jace yelled. He didn't care that the old lady flinched at his voice.

He ran up the staircase always taking three steps at once.

"Mom?" Jace called when he pushed open the door. After coming out of a dark room the light stung in his eyes. J

ace shielded his eyes. Everything seemed normal, so terribly normal! His mother's purse and key were lying on the shelf next to the door – as always.

Why wasn't anybody here? Jace strode further into the flat. "Mum? Mum, it's me!"

Nothing. Both windows of the living room were open and the curtains resembled restless ghosts in the wind. Just when the curtains got limb again Jace noticed the chaos.

The sofa cushion were thrown across the room. Some of them were even ripped open and its stuffing was coming out. The bookshelves had fallen over and had spilled the books on the floor; there were claw marks on the side of the piano and the sheet music was spread through the whole room. That wouldn't have been as bad but Jace froze when he noticed the pictures. Every single one of his mothers beautifully painted pictures was ripped into fine stripes. Whoever had done it had to have used a knife; you couldn't rip the canvas with bare hands.

"No." Jace whispered. "NO!" His scream seemed to echo from the empty walls.

Panicking he ran into the kitchen. Tabasco was spread all over the floor looking almost like blood but Jace almost choked on the sharp smell. All the cupboards were ripped open. He couldn't bear it.

Where was his mother? Had there been a burglar and his mother had tried to take him on? Should he call the police?

That was probably the best option. Where was his mother's phone?

He left the kitchen and went for his mother's purse but he wouldn't get to the door. A growling sound made him whirl around and he ducked just in time to miss the black creature jumping at him. The creature flew past him and dug his claws into the floor to stop sliding. There it sat showing all of its gruesomeness. It was looking like some crossover between a alligator and a millipede.

Jace stood there like a deer in the headlight and stared at the thing.

It stared back.

"_Boy... Meat, blood. Food, aah, food!" _it hissed while it approached Jace.

Suddenly Jace felt as if somebody had filled his veins with ice. Realisation flooded his mind and burning rage replaced his fear. "What have you done to my mother?" he whispered barely holding back from screaming. The creature didn't answer. "_Break his bones, suck out the marrow, drink his blood..."_

"WHAT HAVE YOU DONE!" Jace yelled, grabbed a chair and hauled it at the thing crawling towards him. He had probably used more force than he intended; the chair broke when making contact to the thing's head but it was effective; the creature shook its head confusedly and when it wasn't paying attention Jace threw another chair at it. This one also hit it right into the face and Jace made a run for one of the kitchen drawers.

He quickly gathered all the knives he could find and began throwing them. _There's not much difference from throwing darts. _he realised when the first knife dug into the creatures neck.

One, two, three, four, five; neck, head, missed, back, back.

"Is it dead?" Jace whispered.

The creature's claw twitched. Jace flinched, hurried to get some rum his mother used for baking, hurled the bottle onto the creature that hard that it burst, dug through the drawer for some matches, found them, lit the whole package and also threw it at the mess of being lying on the floor. Flames engulfed the liquid, slowly taking over the remains of the chairs and the creature itself. Suddenly it roared and began trashing and Jace ducked when a burning leg of a chair flew into his direction. F

everishly he searched for something he could hurl at the creature, found methylated spirit, opened the bottle and tossed it over the kitchen unit. The screams of the creature showed him that he hit his target.

He started tossing things again. A frying pan, a heavy iron pot, some plates, cups and bowls were thrown at the creature as well as some tins of beans, peas and other vegetable, another pot, everything he could get his hands on.

Slowly the movements of the thrashing creature died down and finally stopped. Jace stared at the burning mess of kitchen utensils wondering if it was save to slack the fire yet.

"Oh, hell, what a mess!" Jace whirled around to throw the thing he had momentarily at hand – a heavy copper vase – at the person the voice belonged to.

Clary was hit squarely on the head and fell over – it almost looked like a cartoon. Jace stared at her unmoving body for a second before he could hear someone chuckle.

"Clary, Clary, letting your guard down so easily..." The girl from the pandemonium – Isabelle – stepped into sight and kneeled down beside Clary. "Congratulations, she's out cold." She shot him an irritated look. "Did you really have to throw a vase at her?"

Jace shrugged. "She nearly gave me a heart attack..."

"You just don't throw vases at ladies."

"Do I look as if I care?" Jace felt that he was losing his temper and he suspected that he would lose his sanity as well. "I just got attacked by that... that thing, set half of the flat on fire trying to get rid of it and now you're trying to teach me manners? Sorry, but that's..." He laughed humourlessly. "That's just ridiculous."

"Ridiculous or not, you just don't..."

"I KNOW! Look, can we just... get out of here or something? I'm not keen on encountering any more of those creatures..."

Isabelle grimaced. "Alright. But I fear you'll have to carry Clary..."

"I don't have any problems with that." Jace answered and kneeled down to lift the petite girl off the ground. He picked her up in bridal style and shifted her weight until he was comfortable with her lying in his arms. "She's as light as a feather." he smiled.

Isabelle rolled her eyes. "Come on, let's get going!"

"Alright..." He manoeuvred her around the kitchen table, carried her out of the flat but when he was cautiously climbing down the stairs she suddenly leaped up, screaming 'Get your hands off me!' and sent them both flying down the staircase. The last thing Jace heard before he hit the floor at the bottom was Clary cursing.

When he woke up he was lying behind the bushes next to the house.

His chest hurt terribly as well as his wrist and his leg. He realised that he had some difficulties with breathing. It hurt.

"What..." He couldn't finish because of the hand pressing on his mouth.

"Shush! Quiet down or they'll find us!" Clary glared down at him. "You'll better stay down. You broke your left leg as well as some of your ribs."

That would explain the pain. "You forgot my wrist." Jace hissed in pain when he carefully laid his hand down again. "Where are we going now?"

"We're heading for the institute. Alec should be here any second. You know – you're a bit too heavy for us girls to carry."

Jace closed his eyes again and took a deep breath before he flinched when he realised that that too hurt. He broke into a coughing fit and had to keep himself from screaming when his broken ribs protested. When he took his not broken hand from his mouth again his fingers were red.

"Punctured lung." he heard Isabella whisper.

"How could somebody be stupid enough to break a leg, a wrist and puncture his lung while only falling down a staircase!" Clary sighed. "We'll have to get him to the institute as quick as possible or he'll choke from his own blood."

"Alec's not here yet." Isabelle checked her watch.

"We don't have time to wait for Alec. Make way." Jace could make out a glowing object in Clary's hand. She grabbed his hand.

"Clary, what the hell are you doing!" Isabelle hissed but Clary pushed her away. Jace felt a stinging kiss on his wrist and tried to pull away but her grip was surprisingly strong.

"You're insane, Clary! He'll turn into a forsaken!"

A forsaken? Jace frowned but hummed contentedly when the pain in his leg and chest died down.

"I knew it." Clary murmured and Jace could hear her smile.

"What was that?"

"My stele." Clary answered. "The rune will heal your injuries within seconds – as long as they are not inflicted by demon poison or sorts."

Jace sat up and looked at his wrist where a black mark decorated his skin.

"Isabelle?"

"We're here." Isabelle whispered.

"Alec is here." she told Clary and Jace. "Let's go."

**So, I hope you like it. **

**Did I tell you that I love Reviews? **

**Thanks for the Support, I love you, guys! **


	5. The Institute

**Guys! I'm sooo sorry, I didn't upload for ages!  
Fact is that I didn't know how to continue. Plus, I was busy with school stuff and working on my writing style.  
Anyways, I met someone who's exactly like Jace in this story and I was like, very pissed at him last week, so I started writing again and this is the outcome!  
Enjoy!**

* * *

"Are you alright?"  
Jace rolled his eyes. Clary had turned the pain into a dull throbbing but he still couldn't use his leg to its full extend, so he still relied on Alec to steady him. "I was attacked by a monstrous being that could've starred in 'Resident Evil', set half of the flat on fire in order to get rid of it, showered it with a whole cupboard of dishes and got knocked down a staircase by a knife-wielding killer-chick. Apart from a few broken bones and a punctured lung, what do you think how I feel like?"  
Alec chuckled. "If you put it that way I almost feel sorry for asking," he muttered.  
Clary turned around and smirked. "I've got to say that you're really creative when you want to insult somebody. A few days ago you already called us 'crazy freak-fighters' and now I'm already a 'knife-wielding killer-chick'? Impressive. I take it that you can't stand us?"  
Jace glared at her. "I take it that you're not sorry that you knocked me down that staircase?" he mimicked her tone.  
"Nope." Clary let the word roll off her tongue. "I'm never sorry. Life's too short for that."  
Isabelle turned on her heel and walked backwards while grinning at Jace. "Suddenly you're cocky attitude is all gone..."  
Jace grinded his teeth. "I'd really like to see you falling down a staircase."  
"Even that would look graceful," the black-haired girl claimed and turned again.  
Jace frowned and tried to imagine somebody falling down a staircase gracefully, failed miserably and rolled his eyes. "So now you're abducting me after all."  
"Yeah, that's what you can call it," Clary mused. "Still, you could also call it 'save your life', 'offering you shelter after you burned down your flat' or ' trying to keep our secret'. But still, if it turns you on, you can call it 'being abducted by two hot girls and a muscle-monster-guy with massive abs'."  
"I guess I'll just take that as a compliment," Alec muttered and Jace could see that his cheeks were flushed crimson red.  
"Don't make fun of me! Don't you understand that you three just turned my world upside down?" Jace spat and glared at the three of them.  
Clary shrugged without even looking at him. "I don't think we turned your world upside down. I'd rather say that you've been walking on your hands until now and we gave you a little shove... The world has been like this all along and it was you who looked at it the wrong way."  
"Oh great," the blond boy snarled at Clary. "What if I never learned to walk on my feet?"  
"Then you're just stupid. Everybody can learn how to walk on his feet, even if he always walked on his hands," Clary replied without even turning around.  
"What if I'm paralysed?"  
"You're not paralysed," Clary stated. "If you were paralysed the rune I gave you before would've turned you into a _forsaken_."  
Isabelle glared at Clary. "Yeah, about that, what were you thinking?! Hodge will kill you slowly and painfully and I'll gladly watch! I can't believe you took that risk!"  
"Oh shut up. He would've died if I hadn't acted like I did. And after all I was pretty sure he was one of us. He killed a _ravener_ all by himself."  
"Everybody could do that by hitting it unconscious with a chair and setting it on fire!" Isabelle groaned. "Clary, you're just crazy!"  
The girl just shrugged. "I know. Still, everybody loves me, so just zip it. Nothing happened, so thank me that I didn't let our little golden boy here die."  
"Oh thanks! So you risked to turn me into a... whatever when you gave me that tattoo?" Jace deadpanned.  
Clary shrugged. "I risked killing you to save your life."  
"You tried to save him from a quick death by risking to kill him slowly and painfully," Isabelle corrected.  
Jace groaned. "Guys! Would you at least tell me where we are going?"  
"To hell. Or at least, Clary will, once Hodge hears about the rune," Isabelle threatened.  
Clary rolled her eyes before she put on puppy dog eyes. "Please, greatest Izzy of all, I would do whatever you want, just don't tell Hodge!"  
Isabelle groaned. "I'm tempted to let you clean Church's litter box for the next three years, but he has to hear it. How would you want to explain to Hodge that you found out Goldy back there isn't mundane, like we thought before?"  
"Hey, stop talking like I'm not here!" Jace shouted.  
The girls just ignored him. "We could just tell him that he pulled off something great only a shadowhunter could muster."  
"Like, killing a _ravener_-thingy with a chair, booze, a handful matches and a cupboard full of dishes?" Jace offered, annoyed. They ignored him again.  
"A shadowhunter would never fall down a staircase like that," Isabelle offered.  
"Maybe, if he wasn't trained..."  
"Clary, forget about it. He would see right through that lie," the black haired protested.  
"Still, no _mundie _could knock a demon unconscious with just a chair, just like that," Clary stated.  
Alec chuckled again. "Girls, you're running out of time. We're almost there."  
Jace groaned. "I hope so. Any more walking and my leg will kill me!"  
"Hodge will kill me!" Clary shrieked theatrically. "Izzy! Best, best, best, sister of the world, you wouldn't let me die that young?"  
"Forget about it," Isabelle groaned. "I told you, we have to tell him!"  
"No, we don't, we could just push Jacey off a building and act as if he never survived that _ravener._"  
"Clary!"  
"Do you think she's serious?" Jace asked Alec, suddenly nervous.  
Alec shrugged. "I'm not sure. I guess she'd really kill you if it meant to safe her own life."  
"Oh, thanks!" Jace spat. "Now I'm feeling better!"  
"Sorry."  
Clary was silent for a few minutes for the first time since they had started their walk before she suddenly sighed. "I'm as good as dead. We're here."

They came to halt in front of a broken down church with a broken roof.  
Jace frowned. "Like hell I'm going in there!"  
Isabelle cocked an eyebrow. "He saw past our strongest glamour-runes and he's still unable to see the institute?"  
"I already told him how to look past glamour. He told me that I was crazy and refused to try it," Clary explained and opened the gate. The sign 'Danger! Keep out!' flickered for a second, then disappeared. Jace blinked unbelievingly.  
"Glamour for unmoving objects weakens when they're moved," Isabelle explained before she walked past the iron gate. "Come on, golden boy! We need to get Clary killed!"  
"Why, thanks!" Clary muttered. "I don't care if Hodge tries to kill me. I'll just invent a rune for my door that only lets people in that don't want to harm me!"  
"Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't there already a rune with that purpose in the grey book?" Alec piped up.  
"I never learned the runes in the book by heart, like you did, Alec. I'm gifted." Clary grinned like a Cheshire Cat and Alec groaned.  
"Clary!"  
Isabelle sighed. "I really hope Hodge _does _kill you; if he doesn't I'll have to do it. And you know the rule, the one who kills it, has to wipe up the mess."  
Clary shrugged. "You should be grateful to come in contact with my blood, other people would fill phials with it and sell it on the black market."  
Jace groaned. "I never thought I'd walk into a person with a greater ego than I have... And then it has to be a girl!"  
"There are a lot of other things I'm better than you..."  
"Clary, would you please just shut up, my ears are begging for a break!" Alec groaned and put his hands on his ears.  
"You don't have to listen to what I say. After all, I'm not talking to you!"  
She still stayed quiet after that and Jace was grateful for that because when Clary opened the door with a few muttered words and Alec shoved him through it his brain needed every cell to try comprehending what he saw.

"How can this building be bigger on the inside?" he muttered, stunned and unable to find a proper explanation.  
Isabelle rolled her eyes. "I thought Clary had told you about glamour. It makes things we need to hide from mortals look like something totally normal."  
Jace still gaped like a fish. They were standing in a hall which could take in three churches like the one he had seen before entering. "This... This isn't normal!"  
"Give me a definition of 'normal'," Clary scoffed. "I've lived here for years and I think it isn't normal to think that it isn't."  
"There isn't a perfect definition of 'normal'," Isabelle sighed. "We all know that and I'm sure you'll get used to it pretty quickly, too, Goldy."  
"Stop calling me 'Goldy'!" Jace spat. "Things are bad enough as they are, I don't need a obnoxious nickname to top it off!"  
"Aw, now he's angry!" Clary grinned. "Believe me, we're pretty anxious, too. We still have to find out why a ravener demon would attack a mortal."  
"Maybe it was hungry," Jace suggested.  
"Bullshit. Those things are like assassins, they don't act on their own, they have masters," Clary muttered. "Did your mum have any enemies?"  
"What the...? Why would she have enemies?" Jace frowned.  
Isabelle shrugged. "Don't know. Maybe she messed with somebody she shouldn't have messed with."  
Jace wanted to disagree but Alec spoke up. "Still, maybe they weren't after her, but after you, Jace. If you claim that your mother is mundane, what about your father?"  
"My father is dead. He died even before I was born and he was a soldier, no demon-hunter."  
"Are you sure?" Isabelle inquired.  
Jace glared. "How should I know! He didn't look like one of you and he wasn't tattooed either."  
Clary sighed. "Those aren't tattoos, those are..."  
"I KNOW! They are runes or whatever you call it, but they're etched into your skin, so I'll call them tattoos, no matter what you say!"  
"What is all that commotion about?" Jace turned around to search for the owner of the voice and noticed a middle aged man stepping out of a bird-cage-like elevator. Apart from the black marks showing underneath his sleeves he looked totally normal, a bit out of place between all the black dressed killers. If he had worn glasses he could have been a collage professor.  
Clary flinched and looked guilty for a second, then got back her composure, without any doubt making the decision to stand her ground, even if he were to kill her. "Hi, Hodge!"  
So that was Hodge. He looked so much different from what Jace had expected.  
"Who is that?"  
"That's Jace Fray, the boy we told you about," Isabelle explained.  
Hodge tilted his head. "So you can see through our strongest glamour?"  
Jace wanted to answer but Clary rose to speak. "It seems to be some sort of switch on and off thing. At the Pandemonium he had been able to see us, but a few minutes ago he had trouble spotting the institute."  
"That's very interesting. I've never heard of a mundane before who could see through glamour before without training for years..." Hodge mused.  
"He's not mundane. He seems to be one of us," Alec replied. "He can bear runes. Show him."  
Jace turned his arm and showed the black mark etched into his skin. It had begun to fade at its edges but was still clearly visible.  
Hodge drew in a sharp breath. "Who did that?"  
Clary shrugged. "He would've died if I hadn't. He managed to puncture his lung when he fell down the stairs."  
"Clarissa Adele Wayland, how in the archangel's name could you risk that?! He could've turned into a _forsaken_!"  
"Well, he didn't, so tell me, what's the greater problem?" Clary required. "Now we've got a potential shadowhunter with no runes whatsoever standing in the entry hall with a half-healed broken leg and the shock of his life, who's still in denial concerning all of this-" she waved her hand at the giant hall, "and his mother missing, either abducted or fed by a ravener demon which lies dead in his flat underneath a pile of broken dishes. Believe me, Hodge, nothing stinks more than a burned ravener."  
"Why didn't you just use your swords?"  
Clary laughed. "We? We just came in after half of the kitchen had been burned down. Goldy here knocked it unconscious with a chair and set it on fire with rum."  
"Not to forget he showered it with tons of kitchen utensils," Isabelle added. "For somebody untrained he's quite skilled with throwing knifes."  
Clary growled. "Yeah, about that, I owe him a heavy copper vase," she muttered. "Right _there_..." She pointed at the bruise on her forehead. Jace gulped. If she put it that way... He might as well be dead...  
"You owe him nothing!" Hodge answered, suddenly sounding tired. "You risked turning him into a _forsaken_, I think you repaid your dept to him already."  
Clary shrugged. "Maybe. Anyways, what's for dinner?"  
Hodge darted an angry glance at her. Isabelle sighed. "I can fix something, it'll be ready in a few minutes..."  
"I've got an even better idea, I can fetch takeaway from Taki's!" Clary interrupted and fled through the front door. "I'll be back in a minute!"  
Isabelle and Hodge stared after her while Alec did all he could to fight the smile on his face. "Just for your information, Isabelle's cooking is horrible. Never eat anything she made herself if you want to live..." he whispered.  
Jace chuckled darkly. "Can I use it to poison somebody?"  
"It's probably better than any black magic poison you can get from any warlock."  
Jace smiled. Alec showed an awkward smile and angled his head to let his black hair fall over his eyes to hide behind it. "Just... Try not to get a fatal dose."  
"Will do," Jace muttered and for the first time since the ravener had charged at him he had the feeling that he would be able to adjust to this world. He had to, he had to get his mum back, no matter what. Well, maybe everything was pretty normal anyways, except for the demon slaughtering.  
Hodge sighed again. "I have to get back up into my office to work, some vampire got pushed out into the sun and burned to ashes and now somebody claims one of us did it..."  
"Vampires?!" Jace stared at him.  
Hodge shrugged. "Don't worry, they can't get you on sacred grounds like this one."  
Jace shook his head. "No, I mean... Vampires? So are there werewolves, too?"  
Alec nodded.  
"And warlocks?"  
Isabelle nodded.  
"Zombies?"  
Hodge nodded. "Still, the voodoo priests act mostly in the southern countries.  
Jace shook his head. "Next you're going to tell me there are faeries, too!"  
Isabelle nodded. "Sure."  
The blonde threw his hands up in the air in exasperation. "Giants, human eating plants, mummies?"  
Isabelle rolled her eyes at him. "Don't be ridiculous."  
"Well, how should I know!" he tried to defend his pride.  
"Actually I think that there is one kind of demon which uses the light of the sun in his realm to survive. So you could actually compare it to a plant, but not in the way you probably thought," Alec piped up. "For example, it's not green but dark blue."  
"But no glamour in the world could hide giants from human beings. Warlocks have trouble enough to hide their demon marks," Isabelle explained.  
Hodge shrugged. "I guess I can leave you two alone with him. I've got loads of paperwork to do... I think we'll talk later, after Clary arrives with our food."  
With that he climbed back into the elevator. Jace watched the bird cage go up until it was out of sight.  
"Just asking, how big, exactly, is this institute?" he asked Alec.  
"We've got eight upper stories, one down, three staircases, two hundred rooms for visiting shadowhunters, laboratories, training rooms, an armoury, a prison in the cellar and enough corridors to get lost and starve to death all alone..." Isabelle answered instead of her brother. "So don't go walking off alone until you know where you have to go." She grinned like a Cheshire cat.  
"Will do," Jace muttered.  
"For growing up like a mundane you take all of this really well," Alec noted.  
"Now, what shall I do instead?" the blonde asked. "Cry my eyes out? Scream like a little girl? Run circles and laugh like a lunatic? Or try to hit one of you two because you're only trying to confuse me even further?"  
Alec and Isabelle answered at the same time.  
"I'd really like to see that," Isabelle scoffed, while Alec shrugged before he gave a simple: "It would be a more fitting reaction."  
Jace glared at them. Finally he sighed. "Why are we still standing in the entrance hall? Can't I sit anywhere? My leg's killing me!"  
"Sure!" Alec replied. "Let's go to the kitchen, I guess it can't be long until Clary arrives with our food."

* * *

**Sooo, that was it. I won't exactly follow the plot of the book from now on, I'll just twist it around a bit.  
Anyways, somebody asked me, if Jace and Clary were going to be siblings in this story.  
I can tell you, they won't. **

**Know the snowball effect? If you change something very small in the past it can have great effects on the very distant future.  
Just saying.  
I just switched Clary's and Jace's pasts, that's all. The effects turned out to be greater than I originally thought.**

**Well, read you in the next chapter! Bye!**


End file.
